Green Leader Escapes Charges Over Nigel Farage Guillotine Image
30th July 2026
A criminal investigation into UK Green Party leader Zack Polanski was dropped by London’s Metropolitan Police on Wednesday, July 29th, sparking another row over ‘two-tier policing.’
The row began when 20 images were shared on one of eco-zealot Polanski’s official social media accounts. One featured a photo of a Bristol activist wearing a T-shirt depicting a guillotine and the words “We’re only making plans for Nigel.” Reform UK leader Nigel Farage reported the post to police, arguing that it amounted to incitement.
Farage has recently drawn attention to the large number of death threats he receives, particularly since the killing of his colleague Ann Widdecombe. There may be a free speech argument for allowing the image to be shared—even with Polanski’s 713,000 Instagram followers—but Reform officials are understandably nervous. On Wednesday, Farage said that Polanski, as a political leader with a large following,
cannot put out on his social media the image that he did, my name, the guillotine, without some consequences.
However, the Met concluded that sharing the image did not meet the threshold for incitement. Avon and Somerset Police, which examined the conduct of the person wearing the T-shirt because the photograph was taken in its area, also found that “the threshold for a criminal offence has not been met”: